Liz Sherman

Hellboyby yo go re

Though Mezco's Hellboy movie figures were great, there was one obvious character who never got the plastic treatment. We got Hb himself, of course, and his sidekick, Abe Sapien. We got two versions of Kroenen, the clockwork man, and even a figure of Rasputin, who didn't look like anything more than a plain human. All that, but we didn't get the BPRD's resident firestarter, Liz Sherman? A travesty! Thankfully, Mezco heard the complaints, and made sure to put Liz in the first series of their comic-inspired line.

Liz Sherman was a normal child until her pyrokinetic abilities began to manifest themselves when she turned 11. The manifestation took the lives of her mother, father, and only brother, as well as an entire city block. The final tally was 32 casualties, including three firefighters. Liz's file states that her last uncontrolled manifestation was July 4, 1984, but Liz is only just beginning to come to grips with her powers.

In Mike Mignola's motley cast of characters, Liz is the most typical "Marvel mutant" one: she's got powers that she was born with and which usually cause her no end of problems. She'd fit right in at the X-Mansion.

The biggest strength of this line is probably the great job Mezco did with the sculpts, really capturing Mignola's blocky, angular art while still keeping everyone looking human (or at least as human as they should). Liz is wearing the outfit seen in Wake the Devil: a tight body suit beneath a bulky jacket. She's got her sleeves pushed up to her elbows, and her jacket is tucked in to her utility belt.

The likeness is quite impressive. Liz just has a blank stare on her face, and while for most figures that would be a bad thing, Liz is always kind of spacey and depressed - that's what happens when an 11-year-old has to deal with killing dozens of people. She had a blank stare in the comics, and she has a blank stare here; what more could you want?

The paint on the first prototypes seemed rather flat and lifeless, but that's definitely been corrected here. The colors seem to come straight out of the comic - Mezco did a particularly nice job with the subtle tones of her coat, using shadows to help reinforce the angles. Her suit is more of a dark grey than a true black, which means that they could still get some dark shadows on it. Her belt, boots and gloves are a dark brown, and there are no paint errors worth mentioning; even the big red belt buckle is applied nicely. And check out the painted-on logos; they're very well done.

Mezco showed with its movie line that it wasn't afraid of articulation, and the comic figures are no different. Liz moves at the head, shoulders, elbows, wrists, waist, hips, knees and shins. No ankles, but they're not really missed. They might have given us articulation where her arms come out of her sleeves, but it wouldn't have added anything. Due to the design of her coat, they couldn't manage a chest joint of any sort. Still, this is perfectly fine. She moves more than a DC Direct figure, after all. Mezco retained the movie line's scale for these figures, so Liz will fit in with your existing collection at 7 1/2" tall.

Liz is short on accessories, but what she does get is very nice. First of all is a detailed BPRD backpack, which is designed to fit against the jacket perfectly. The straps plug into the big pouches on the sides, so it looks like a seamless piece but can still be removed with ease.

It'd be remarkably dumb to release a figure of a pyrokinetic without any fire, and Mezco didn't disappoint.
Liz has two flame blasts that plug into her left palm, and a cigarette that fits (somewhat) between her right fingers. The flames look really nice, because they were molded from clear plastic with hints of red and orange - none of that solid crap here. The cig is very easy to lose, so be careful, and be prepared to go on a hunt if you knock her over and it falls from her fingers.

Hellboy fans had been waiting quite a while for a Liz Sherman figure, and Mezco totally delivered. She's hardly the pegwarmer of the line, so apparently giving us a much-requested character with a great sculpt, good articulation and an accurate paint job is a recipe for success. Can't wait to see what they have in store for Series 2.

Why the hell didn't we ever get a movie Liz? Tell us on our message board, The Loafing Lounge.